Janette DuCharme
}} Category:Known Vampires Category:LaCroix's Vampires Category:Nick's Vampires Category:Main Characters Janette was a main character during the first two seasons of Forever Knight and appeared or was mentioned in three episodes of the third season.The vast majority of the original information in this article first appeared in Amy Rambow's The Janette FAQ originally written in 1996 and updated many times since then. She is usually referred to simply by the name "Janette." In present day Toronto, she uses the name Janette DuCharme, but while she used "DuCharme" as early as 1228,Be My Valentine the surname does not necessarily bear any relation to Janette's mortal origin. In The Human Factor, Janette uses the surname "de Brabant." She is known by no other aliases. Age and appearance Though there are historical reasons for supposing Janette to have been younger, judging from Ms. Duchene's appearance Janette was perhaps 26-30 when brought across in the eleventh century. Thus, she is around 900-1000 years old. She appears to stand 5'8" and weigh around 135 lbs. She has blue eyes and black hair, which she wears in accordance with contemporary trends. However, it has never been seen shorter than shoulder-length.During one of the Dead of Winter convention question and answer sessions, Ms. Duchene indicated that James D. Parriott specifically stated that Janette would always appear with her hair up when inside The Raven. This was countermanded in later episodes by different directors. In flashbacks, Janette always dresses at the height of the era's fashion. In the present, her choices may be explained as appropriate for her situation: "goth" as the owner of the Raven, and "contemporary casual" when she moved to Montreal. She wears black and red almost exclusively. The only exceptions occur when she appears in white in Dark Knight 1 during the flashback scenes, in brown in A Fate Worse than Death, in grey in Near Death, and in white in The Human Factor. Janette almost always wears earrings, frequently wore chokers as owner of the Raven (throughout first season), and was once seen getting a tattoo.Faithful Followers In the first season, Janette wore black almost exclusively. In the second season, she frequently wore red dresses with gold accents. Personality Janette is the most enigmatic of the major Forever Knight characters, in part because of her lack of screen time, and in part because of an apparently reticent nature; she does not often talk about herself, and we have seen Nick still strangely uninformedI Will Repay, A Fate Worse than Death, Near Death about her past after 800 years. Until The Human Factor, Janette had always enthusiastically embraced her vampirism -- "I like what I am" -- and mortality has never been something she actively sought. Janette has also always embraced vengeance, her own sense of justice, from DaviauJanette's human pimp in A Fate Worse than Death to Larouche, Robert's murdererThe Human Factor. In the present, Janette has created a society around her, through the patrons, employees, and inhabitants of the Raven. While she has often been seen as the very symbol of the vampire community, concerning herself with that community more than any other character, she has also been kind not only to Nick's mortal friends, but to the mortal prostitutes she has sheltered at the Raven (though she tries to keep her kindnesses firmly behind the scenes). In fact, Janette has almost never been seen alone. She has also expressed a desire to cling to her "homes," once she finds them.Father's Day, The Human Factor Despite mocking Nick's involvement in the mortal world, she interacts with it herself as necessary in the course of her business: Janette supervises the Raven nightly instead of hiring a manager, does her own taxes when she has an accountantCan't Run, Can't Hide, reads newspapers and tracks her competitionBlood Money, worries about inspections and has come to an understanding with the local organized crime groupFather's Day. Janette has shown herself supremely adaptable to circumstances through the centuries, and she seems to consider herself practical and extremely realistic. Above all, Janette is a survivor. Origins and life Janette was rescued from her mortal existence as a prostitute by Lacroix, who brought her across with the promises that no mortal would ever touch her again without her consent, and that he wanted her to be "so much more than mere nobility".A Fate Worse than Death One or two centuries later, she seduced Nick, and opened the door to Lacroix, who then brought him across.Dark Knight (1992 Pilot), Near Death, Dance by the Light of the Moon Janette traveled with Nick and Lacroix for most of the following eight centuries, leaving them for a time in the Renaissance,Partners of the Month as well as having other, unexplained, absences. Her relationship with Nick has flared and cooled over the centuries, but they have rarely been together without an intimate attitude. Janette moved to Toronto in approximately 1975 (BB1), according to Lacroix (there is no independent confirmation of that, and Lacroix may have had reason to lie or exaggerate), and was operating the Raven for at least three years before DK. In 1995, she left Toronto for Montreal. While there, she fell in love with a mortal, and when he was killed, she somehow became mortal herself. Later, as Janette lay dying in Nick's arms, he pleaded with her to let him bring her back across; she refused. Crying out in anguish, Nick brought her across. Personal relationships Currently, Janette is known to be related only to Nick Knight, her new vampire master (once her vampiric brother and lover), and through him to his only-known, other, living "child," Serena.Baby, Baby Many fans believe that she brought over the Baroness Sophia in If Looks Could Kill, and is (or was) thus Sophia's master, but this can be disputed based on Janette's comments about being a glutton and unable to stop prior to death.I Will Repay Other relationships include: *Anna, deceased, a friend as mentioned in A Fate Worse than Death *Lacroix, whoserved as her vampire master for eight centuries *Robert McDonagh, her deceased loverIn The Human Factor she says of Robert "I was in love with him." *Patrick McDonagh, the son of her lover, and once her wardIn The Human Factor she says of Patrick "I'm his mother" In her positions as the owner of the Raven, Janette's relationships include customer and decorator Alma,For I Have Sinned, Love You to Death bartender Miklos,A Fate Worse than Death, Bad Blood customer Mirah,For I Have Sinned and employee BriannaA More Permanent Hell. Janette's other contacts include Larry Merlin, vampire computer expert,Hunters and Aristotle, who creates false lives for relocating vampiresForward Into the Past. A number of vampires live in the basement of the Raven.Hunters Janette is acquainted with Natalie from the episode Cherry Blossoms onward, and though she claims Natalie is not her "friend", she admires Natalie as a "surgeon" and is solicitous of her.A More Permanent Hell, Faithful Followers Janette meets Schanke for the first time in For I Have Sinned, shelters him in Hunted, and commiserates with him in Partners of the Month. A Fate Worse than Death reveals that Janette regularly offers mortal prostitutes shelter in her club, while forbidding the men involved in that business entrance. The Human Factor Although Janette appears in many episodes, The Human Factor remains among the most controversial and discussed. The episode is widely considered a painful assassination of character -- Janette's, primarily, but also Nick's, in my personal, subjective opinion. Its ambiguity has caused several heated debates, with great passion on all sides. It must be acknowledged that the episode covers less than a year in a life of a thousand years. There was once considerable controversy about Janette surviving the end of The Human Factor. She did, for not only is that explicit in the script, it can be pieced together from slivers of evidence on screen. In some few broadcast locations, however, the tag of HF was cut slightly through a technical error, coincidentally removing the most vital evidence of Janette's survival. The fact that Reese impatiently calls Nick in for his shift, after Nick had "booked off" sick the previous night, indicates that the tag of HF occurs the night after the rest of the episode. Because of this -- and that phone call from Reese is absolutely vital -- Nick's comment that Janette must have brought the portrait "today" indicates that she survived the final scene before the tag. Footnotes